In increasing efforts to improve systems for the monitoring and control of wind turbine operation, wind turbine blades are sometimes provided with additional systems incorporated into the blade design. Such systems may comprise blade sensors and monitoring devices, e.g. strain and loading sensors, accelerometers; actuators for the control and operation of blade devices, such as active lift devices, e.g. flaps, spoilers, etc.; and/or deflection and position monitoring devices.
As such systems are often based on the use of controlling electronics, this can result in the provision of wind turbine blades having internal conductive modules provided along the length of the blade, spaced from the root end. Such conductive modules may act to attract a lightning strike, and accordingly require adequate lightning protection.
Traditional lightning protection of conductive elements in a blade involves the use of pluralities of external lightning receptors having lightning diverter strips extending freely therefrom, as seen in European Patent No. EP1709705. However, the increasing complexity of the internal conductive modules and their functions has led to the inadequacy of such current solutions, in respect of providing sufficient lightning protection combined with low interference with the operation of the modules.
It is an object of the invention to provide a lightning protection system for a wind turbine blade which provides improved performance over solutions.